


Help Me Home

by carryonstarkid



Category: Thunderbirds
Genre: Character Study, Discussion of PTSD, Gen, I sure do love my girl, Relationship Study
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-06
Updated: 2017-05-06
Packaged: 2018-10-28 13:18:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 6,727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10832064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/carryonstarkid/pseuds/carryonstarkid
Summary: Lady Penelope is rescued by her boys.





	1. Shattered Crystal

It’s a Dom Perignon Vintage 1973, sold for roughly nineteen thousand dollars at a high-end New York City auction house just a week before her wedding.  This sort of wine, she knows, is most often purchased for the investment.  It is sold with the understanding that the owner will proudly display it somewhere between their Monet and their Rembrandt, because the quality of this century old, top standard wine can only be matched by that of the old masters.  This bottle has traveled the world alongside first edition Hemingways and original Tiffany lamps, which means that it is absolutely, positively _never_ meant to be opened.

And yet.

There’s a pop of the cork.  Smoke curls over the lip of the bottle, catching the golden candlelight that cuts through the evening.  Crystal _ping_ s as she pours, her hands shaky and her gaze unfocused, until she finally pulls herself back.  Yes.  This will do just fine.  Bubbles in her wine, bubbles in her tub.  So far, so good.

She sets both the glass and the bottle among the candles and the rose petals, a study in relaxation perched at the corner of her stone tub.  Everything is exactly as it should be and so she finally drops her towel, takes one step in, then another, until slowly she feels the heat soaking into every last muscle.  Maybe it’s the warmth or maybe it's the aroma of fine French wine, but it feels like she’s bathing in liquid wealth.  This must be what it’s like, she thinks, to swim in a tub of molten gold.

Everything about the evening feels like home, from the smell of roses, to the fresh pink towel behind her neck, to the swim trunks hanging from the nearby bar.  Everything about the evening feels familiar and peaceful and _fine_.  Everything is fine, just as long as she doesn’t think too hard about it.

She reaches for the glass, pulls the stem between her first and second fingers as she brings it to her lips.  The trick with the expensive wine is that she has to work slowly.  These are hundred dollar sips, after all, so one must take the time to really, properly enjoy them.  That’s the idea.  She can’t afford to down three, four, five glasses—not tonight.  Not tonight.

And so it’s a sip here.  A sip there.  Turns out that a century tastes how charcoal smells, each little sip of the past accompanied by a rebellious bite of flame.  It only takes about half a glass for her to feel it, the warmth on the inside now matching that on the outside, and finally she can let her eyes fall shut.  With her hair pulled back, her arm draped across the side of the tub, a wine glass in hand, it’s all perfectly fine.

Except when she closes her eyes, she doesn’t smell the roses anymore.  When she closes her eyes, it’s like all the bubbles have popped, and the candles have been blown out, and her water is ice cold.

The man speaks at her in Farsi and although she understands most of it, it’s a local dialect.  Some of it takes some translating, but by the time she can piece it together, he has already lost his patience with her.  How many seconds—how many seconds has it been since she could last breathe?  How many more seconds of air will he give her before he takes it away again?  It’s hot.  She doesn’t have the information he wants, and even if she does she won’t be giving it up.

And she’s trained for this—she is—but that simply doesn’t make it any less terrifying.  That doesn’t make it any less torturous.  No matter how many hours she spends in training, she will never learn how to breathe underwater.  How many days has it been?  She’s tired.  She’s hungry.  Funny enough, she’s thirsty.

Is this how she finally fails?  How would Gordon handle it, if she were to drown?

Crystal shatters.  Two thousand dollars worth of Dom Perignon splashes dark against stone floors and she finally opens her eyes again.  The water seems to rise by the second, up and up and up, until it’s wrapped around her neck and she can’t breathe anymore.  Everything feels wrong—all wrong.  There’s candlelight and roses and Gordon’s voice.  

Gordon’s voice.  She’s home.  

“Penelope?” he calls.  “Hey.  Pen?  Listen, I’m coming in, okay?”

And she so desperately wants to scream out to him and tell him no.  Tell him she’s fine, that he shouldn’t come in, that she doesn’t want him to watch her drown, but she can’t get a grip on her words and anyways, it wouldn’t stop him.

He starts with a peek and whatever he sees elicits a full swing of the door.  “Aw jeez,” he says, an eye towards the floor and, more specifically, the shattered crystal.  When he looks up at her, his expression doesn’t change one bit.  “Is it November again?”

Of course it’s November.  It’s always November.  It’s been four months and she still can’t forget about the November op.

“Hey now—hey.  You’re home.  We got you home, remember?” he says, and he picks up the larger pieces of glass, tosses them into the trash like they’re not worth their weight in old money.  And now that they’re broken, she supposes they aren’t.  “You’ve got to take your time with these things, Pen—hey, c’mon. Don’t cry.  It’s okay.  Really.  It’s okay.”

He lays a towel down over the rest of the shards, then pulls another from the rack and holds his hand out to her.  “I wish you didn’t think you had to do this alone,” he says.  “C’mon.  Out of the water.  It’s not gonna happen tonight.”

She isn’t sure when she started shaking again, but it suddenly seems far too obvious when she stands.  Maybe it’s just cold in here.  Maybe there’s nothing wrong with her at all.  Maybe Gordon’s the one overreacting, and she’s perfectly fine.

She wraps the towel around herself and he helps her over the edge of the tub.  Not even a single second passes before he pulls her in close and she realizes that, oh, yes.  He had been right.  She is crying.  Imagine that.  “Yeah, I know,” he says, an arm around her waist and a hand in her hair.  “I know it’s not really okay.”

And they just stand there.  They stand there for a really long time, and even though she’s trained to count the seconds, she can’t help feeling like it’s been an eternity before he speaks again.  “Is that the wine your father gave us for the wedding?” he asks.  “You opened a ‘ _73_ Dom Perignon?  Pen, I don’t think I’ve ever been more in love with you than I am right now.”

“It’s silly,” she spits.  “Everything about this was a bad idea.”

He squeezes her hips, then pulls her away.  Maybe he wants to make sure she can really hear him when he says, “I have been waiting _years_ to open that.  I just never wanted to be the one who did it.  I thought I was going to have to wait until I was a grumpy old man who didn’t care about anything anymore.”

This, despite the evening, earns a laugh out of her.  It’s a short thing—barely there—but it’s a laugh, nonetheless.  “I’m sorry to waste it, then.”

“Oh no, no, no,” he says.  “We are _not_  wasting it.”

He lets her go, taking a seat with his back against the tub.  It’s a swift scoop of the bottle before he takes a generous swig, and then he pats the space just next to him.  Leave it to Gordon Tracy to _swig_ an expensive wine straight from the bottle. “Do not let me drink this whole thing, Pen.  Because I will.  Happily.”

She rolls her eyes, swipes her nose, slugs her way over to his side.  She sees what he’s doing—it’s the very same thing he always does—but it’s working.  She’s suddenly a lot warmer than she was before, now that he’s got his arm around her shoulders.  It’s all just a little bit better when she knows she’s home. When he passes her a genuine antique and tells her to drink up. When he says, “Penelope?” like she isn’t already hooked on every word he has to say.  “I know it doesn’t feel like it, but it really does get easier.”

“I know,” she says, looking up at him.  “I know it does.”


	2. Frayed Rope

One one thousand.

Hyperbole is the sort of thing she’s learned to forgive.  

She used to view it as some sort of betrayal, twisting words around until they no longer meant what they were supposed to.  Language was supposed the be precise enough that it could be decoded halfway around the world, explicit enough to determine times and dates and destinations with utmost accuracy, efficient enough to build entire empires upon which the sun never set.  Language was supposed to be the difference between man and animal, and to abuse such a gift— to  _exploit_ it—by way of egregious exaggeration was as foolish as it was dangerous.

She had thought that.  Once upon a time.

One one thousand, two one thousand.

Except there are times when hyperbole is necessary.  There are times when the face value of language cannot possibly amount to the actual cost of a situation.  She sees it in the boys—each one a hyperbole all his own—whenever they finish a hard day.  She sees it in Alan when he “could literally eat an entire field of cows right now” and spots it in Virgil after he promises to sleep for centuries.  Scott’s shoulders have always carried the weight of the world, John has always lived a million miles in the sky, and Gordon… well.  What _isn’t_ hyperbolic about Gordon?

She’s learned to forgive hyperbole.  Maybe she has even come to understand it, because sometimes language fails man.  Sometimes a child dies, despite all the attempts to save them or a plane crashes, despite all the efforts to keep it flying.  Sometimes terrible things happen, and there aren’t words that can describe the toll it takes on those who are left to feel it.

One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand.

But this is where they must be careful, because hyperbole doesn’t just enhance language.  It also demeans it.  A press that prints bills only devalues the currency.  Too much growth will inevitably cause a decline.  When hyperbole utilizes the big words for small inconveniences, words like _millions_ and _miles_ and _forever_ are reduced to practically nothing.  Words like _torture_ suddenly become—for lack of a better phrase—watered down.

One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand, four.

There are ropes around her wrists and surprisingly that’s the worst part, because every time she struggles, she’s met with fire on her skin.  Hot.  Everything’s hot here.  Is it always hot in November?  The concrete at her back burns like the sun and the air is packed with pounds of sand.  She sometimes makes the mistake of being thankful when the water hits her, but the relief doesn’t last long.  With water comes fire.  The breath of a dragon curls its way through her nose, her throat, her lungs.  She pukes.  How long has she been awake?

One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand, four.  Five one thousand.

The voice is harsh.  The words are Farsi.  She wonders, briefly, if Farsi utilizes hyperbole to the same extent that English does.  “I don’t know,” she says, and she’s not sure which language she uses.  “I won’t tell you.  I don’t know.”

The ropes are frayed, a thousand needless wrapped around raw skin.  There’s blood.  There’s sweat.  There’s a million different reasons for her to give an answer.

One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand, four.  Five one thousand, six one thousand.

Breathe.  She has to breathe.

The voice is yelling at her again.  Screaming at her.  She’s so tired.  She knows the language, but the words are failing her and all she wants is hyperbole.  Somewhere in the mess, she hears English.  “Have you had enough yet, or would you like more?”

One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand, four.  Five one thousand, six one thousand, seven one thousand—

She spits.  “More.”

It’s not hyperbole—not even a little bit—to say that Scott Tracy is a hero.  It’s not hyperbole to say that when he breaks into buildings, he does it by kicking down doors, shattering windows, tearing down the very walls.  Scott is the sort of man for whom anger comes like poetry, smooth and easy,  and he doesn’t need exaggeration to make his point known.

Red stains her wrist.  Black stains her line of sight.  There’s a buzz in her ears until Scott’s voice takes everything over.  “You don’t know how glad I am to see you.”

“I think, perhaps,” she says, “that I am infinitely gladder to see you.”

He nods, reaches out to her, and she flinches at his touch.  How long has it been?  How long has it been since someone has touched her without malicious hyperbole?  

It doesn’t go unnoticed.  “I’m gonna help you up, Lady P,” he says.  “Is that okay?  Can I help you up?”

Her laugh is little more than a huff.  “Oh, I think you may have to do more than that, darling.”

She is stripped of the frayed rope and before she’s entirely sure of what’s happening, the world is scooped out from under her.  She’s tired.  Maybe it’s a dream.  Maybe she’s dead.  “Come on,” he says.  “Let’s get you home.”


	3. Fractured Knuckle

It’s not a break.

Gordon thinks it’s a break, but recently Gordon’s started to act like everything about her is broken.  Stolen glances across the room, language padded at every corner, each and every one of his touches equal to that of a glassmaker—it’s a dance.  Every move he makes is carefully choreographed.

So it’s not a surprise—not really—that when Penelope insists on hosting Christmas dinner, Gordon suggests that maybe Scott should take care of it this year.  It’s not a surprise that, when put to a vote, the brothers outnumber her five-to-one.  Nothing too big, they had told her.  Keep it small, like when we were kids.  We’re just glad to have everyone home.

In other words, Gordon is not the only one who’s dancing around her.

“… you did to your hands?”

Oh.  Right.  That would be John’s voice.  She had been talking to John, sometime, about something, sitting across from him like she has so many times before.  How many seconds has it been?  How long has she been gone?  “Hmm?”

A low hum buzzes through the villa, conspiratorial whispers taking place just below the melody of Virgil’s piano.  “Your hands,” he says.  “I asked if you ever planned to tell me what happened to your hands.”

His words bring back the throbbing, a steady one-two-three rhythm that waltzes across her knuckles in a deep purple gown.  In one blood-splotched hand, she holds a slender champagne glass filled with sparkling cider.  In the other, a pendant, flipping and twiddling through absent-minded fingers.  It’s a birthday present from Gordon, far more modest than anything he’s given her in the past, as if her neck cannot possibly hold the weight of something more extravagant.  Funnily enough, it is now the heaviest necklace she owns.  

She spares John a smile.  “Oh, you mean Gordon didn’t tell you?” she tries.

And for all his talent, John has never been a particularly graceful dancer.  “I didn’t ask if he was going to tell me,” he says.  “I asked if you would.”

“Good, good,” she says.  “Going straight to the source.”

“Penelope.”

“No, I applaud you for your effort, John.”

“If you don’t want to tell me, then you don’t have—”

“It’s a sprain.”  She takes a smooth sip from her cider, desperately wishing for something stronger.  There isn’t even any eggnog at this so-called Christmas dinner.  No eggnog, no extravagance, and why is it so hot on this godforsaken island?  It may as well not even be Christmas at all.  “I was boxing and I sprained the second knuckle on my left hand—which, by the way, is something that happens quite frequently to boxers and has been happening to me since I was six years old.”

“So you know what it feels like,” John offers.

“Precisely,” she says.  “I know when something is a sprain, and this is exactly that.  Gordon is under the impression that I’ve fractured it, but Gordon happens to be wrong.”

John’s retuning nod is slow and considerate and for the first time in a month, she feels like she’s finally speaking English again.  “Okay,” he says.  “Okay, I believe you.”

“No you don’t.”

“Sure I do.”

“Do you want to go get drinks, John?” she says.  Virgil’s piano plays on.  Someone’s singing.  How long has she been here?  “What do you think?  You.  Me.  We abscond from this Holly Jolly Joke and see what kind of real trouble we can get into, just like old times.”

“No bars open on Christmas,” he says, not missing a beat.

She shrugs.  “The must be a Jewish barkeep somewhere.”

“I don’t have a way off the island.”

“Help me steal the keys from Gordon, and we have ourselves a flying car.”

“Penelope…”

“Let’s do it.  Let’s leave.”

“It’s not a good idea.”

“Why?” she snaps, but she knows his answer.  “Why not?  What is the problem?  Say it.”

The music is low and she feels the throb of a fractured knuckle— _sprained,_ dammit all, it’s _sprained_ —but now even John looks at her like she’s just another one of their victims.  “Your doctors said—”

“I’m not _broken_ , John!”  The music halts and instead of Virgil’s melody, she now hears her own voice bouncing off tall glass walls and high glass ceilings.  She suddenly feels too short, because when she shoots up, so does he, and it doesn’t escape her notice that she’s the smallest person in this room.  “I am not just someone you boys saved from the desert—I’m _fine._ Everything is perfectly fine, and I know what I’m doing, and I am not about to crumble where I stand, so could we please stop pretending otherwise and—my _god._ What does someone have to do around here to get a decent drink?”

The whole room has eyes locked on her.  They don’t even do her the honor of dancing anymore.  Suddenly everything is direct and clinical.  Gordon won’t look away.  She doesn’t meet his gaze.

John takes her glass, sets it down, pulls her hand into his so that she’s forced to see the same thing as everyone else.  Her knuckles are scabbed, bruises vining up and down her fingers.  She feels her heartbeat in her deepest flaws and she wishes the music was still at her back.  “We don’t think you’re broken, Penelope,” he says.  “But we do think that it might be time to take a break.”

 _We_.  So they’ve recruited John, then.  Given him a mission statement and told him to convince her that the best way to get better is to stop working, sit down, relax.  As if she could ever relax knowing that if she had just run a little faster, moved a little quieter, punched a little harder, then none of this would have happened.  “Oh that’s what you think, is it?” she says, but she doesn’t wait for an answer.  Instead she tears her hands away—a mistake, certainly, but not one that she plans on admitting to.  “Gordon, I’d like to go home now.”

And there he is, equally too close and not close enough, shooting up off the body of Virgil’s piano with the kind of fervent loyalty that only comes when someone you love suddenly becomes someone you no longer know.  “Yeah.  Yeah, sure thing, Pen.  We’ll just say our goodbyes and—”

“I’d like to leave now, please.”

“Yeah,” he says one more time.  “No, yeah, course you do.  C’mon.  S’been a long night.  Merry Christmas, everyone.  We’ll see you soon.”

He puts a jacket over her shoulders, even though there’s really no need, and he walks her down the stairs.  Apparently even walking is off limits now.  More and more it seems like every case she makes for her sanity is just more evidence that can be used against her, so maybe it’s time to stop trying.  Maybe she can’t convince them.  Maybe she’s in this alone.  

As they walk away into Christmas night, the music begins to play again.


	4. Dropped Cover

She remembers these long days.  Remembers standing backstage in some grand, historical London theatre, peaking out at the audience, lacing up her slippers, stretching herself into the most spectacular positions.  She remembers taping her ankles and running through the show in her head, remembers stepping out on stage to the sound of a woman’s melody—something in a minor key, something in a language she hadn’t yet understood—as she discovered life through the eyes of her character.

A fourth row ticket to the Bolshoi Theatre holiday ballet generally runs somewhere between eight thousand and ten thousand rubles.  If they’re performing Tchaikovsky, ticket prices are nearly double that.  Shows sell out months in advance, but the chances are that if you truly belong at the Bolshoi, then you do not have to _buy_  your tickets to begin with.  

Virgil Tracy has somehow secured two.  “You really do look lovely tonight.”

And of course.  Of course she looks lovely, because this dress is designer and the band in her hair is one step below a tiara and she’s always had a gift for being the prettiest ballerina in the room, except she isn’t dancing tonight.  She doesn’t know the choreography. Gloves feel like rope burn around her wrists and her scars seem obvious beneath the sheer scarf. The bottom of her dress is made up of dull silver satin while her torso is covered in roughly half a million dollars worth of stitched-on diamonds.  She can’t help but feel a bit unbalanced.  How long has it been, since she was last home?  “Did Gordon tell you to say that?”

Because she suspects that this entire thing is Gordon’s idea.  The past two weeks have been an endless strand of Let’s Dress Up and Let’s Go Out and You’re Beautiful, Pen.  Now he’s gotten Virgil to do his dirty work.  “Actually, Lady Penelope, I reached that conclusion on my own.  Gordon had nothing to do with it,” he says.  “And for the record, Gordon had nothing to do with my inviting you here either.  Just so we’re clear.”

“So you just _happened_  upon two tickets to the finest production of the Nutcracker that the world of ballet has to offer, did you?”

“No, I just _happened_ to have saved the daughter of the Russian Prime Minister a few weeks ago and was offered these tickets as a sign of thanks.”

“I thought you boys didn’t take gifts.”

“To be honest, I was a little afraid not to.”

Penelope grants him this much.  “Mmm.  Yes.  The Prime Minister is a bit much at times,” she says.  “Still doesn’t explain why you brought me.”

“You’re the only person I know who wants to watch a ballet for three hours,” he says, which is also true, but it comes far too quickly.  Like he’s rehearsed it, over and over, one plié at a time.  He’s dancing again.  She hates it when they dance.  “Not to mention that it helps to have a beautiful woman on my arm for these sorts of events.”

“He _did_ tell you to say that.”

“Okay, yeah, he told me to say that one,” Virgil admits. “The other one was all me though.  Scout’s honor.”

In her profession, it is crucial that she be able to spot a liar.  Penelope is exceedingly talented in this respect, not because she is particularly perceptive when it comes to nervous ticks or racing heartbeats, but because she is capable of stepping into a role.  She did it as a girl, dressed up in tights and a leotard, and she does it now, dressed up in wigs and cover legends.  She knows when a person is lying, because she spends her whole life lying.  She knows how to be someone else.

Right now, she’s Virgil.  She’s the brother-in-law who was always the middle ground, always responsible for keeping the peace.  She’s the glamorous billionaire who is more than capable of finding a date that isn’t herself.  She’s Gordon’s best friend, and she’s just trying to give everyone a night off.  “I think you are lying to me, Mr. Tracy,” she says.

“You’re free to think that,” he says.  “Seats fourteen and fifteen.  This is us.”

He leaves the aisle seat to her, plush red velvet lined in gold.  At her front sits a man with the largest bouquet of roses she’s ever seen.  She can’t help it—can’t help but analyze the man’s every move—can’t help but become him.  She’s the gentleman with a smile.  The gentleman with flowers, sitting three rows in.  She’s the gentleman without a date who waits rather impatiently for the curtain to open.  “That young man is dating one of the dancers,” she tells Virgil.  “Probably one of the ensemble members.”

Virgil plays along.  “How do you know?”

“The larger the bouquet, the smaller the role.”

“Noted.”

“I still think you’re lying to me about your motives.”

“Also noted.  Program?”

He hands her the booklet and she flips through with no great regard to what’s actually on the pages.  Sometimes she will stumble upon a biography and she’ll become the theater director, the spotlight technician, the prima ballerina herself.  She dances through all these different roles, seeing the world through the eyes of others so that their actions finally make sense.  There’s a minor melody in her ears that she can’t ignore. It’s the sort of thing that bleeds through from her work, the sort of thing she’s been doing since her very first recital, the sort of thing that’s programmed into her.  It’s easier than being herself.

Maybe that’s why she can’t ignore the most obvious of them all.

She’s Gordon.  She’s Gordon, and she’s back home, finally enjoying a night off from the nightmares and the scars and the silence.  She’s Gordon, and she’s glad she called Virgil—glad that, at least for a few hours, she won’t have to worry about her wife throwing a tantrum or breaking her hands or crying.  Just crying.  She’s Gordon, and she needs Penelope _out of the house_ for a night, because it’s too much.

She’s too much.

“So what did he offer you?” she asks.  “He takes ‘Two out for rescues for a day, if you take his wife off his hands for the evening?”

There’s an uncomfortable shift on Virgil’s part, and she knows that she’s caught him on an off note.  “That’s not it at all.”

“Something with Scott then, no doubt,” she says.  “So Gordon’s the one who has to fly to New York with him next time he wants to—”

“There wasn’t a deal,” Virgil says.  “None of this is part of a _deal_ , Penelope.  Believe it or not this actually was my idea and, by the way, I practically had to peel him off of you.  He doesn’t want anyone taking you of his hands—he doesn’t even want you out of his sight.”

She stumbles.  “I’m not really sure what you mean.”

The program is now a tube, twisted up in her palms, and Virgil eyes it before he looks up at her.  “I noticed it at Christmas,” he says.  “Gordon means well—Gordon usually does—but he’s hanging all over you.  He only remembers what it’s like to be a trauma victim, but I remember what it’s like to be a trauma victim’s brother.”

“I still don’t—”

“ _He’s_ not trying to get you out of the house,” Virgil says.  “I am.  You need time to think about things without Gordon.  You need times to go out and put on a nice dress and feel like you’re normal.  As it so happens, the Bolshoi Theatre is normalcy for you—which is kind of ridiculous, by the way, if you think about it.”

This earns a laugh, because it is a bit silly to think that such elegance could possibly be an average Saturday evening, and yet, here they are.  The realization feels like a fresh breath of air.  “I thought he was just getting tired of me.”

“You were gone for eleven days,” says Virgil, and it’s the first time anyone’s ever really been so direct about it.  “And we thought you were dead for about seven of them.  If Gordon had his way, you’d never leave the house again.”

Once—only once, when she was a very little girl—she fell on stage.  She had jumped into the air and missed her plié.  It was after a long week of practices, in front of an audience that included her entire family, and it had been the worst feeling she’d ever known.  That’s what it feels like, to hear Virgil’s words.  To have him speak to her in such a way that he might have lost her.  That they all might have.  She hears that minor melody in her ears once more and feels the holes in her tights, ripping and shredding all along her leg.  “I didn’t know,” she says.  “I just assumed—”

“Yeah, here’s the thing, Lady Penelope,” he says.  “I’m not sure what it is you do for a living, exactly, and I know I never will, but let me just say that when it comes to trauma, it usually doesn’t help much to try and guess what _other_ people are thinking.”  He looks at her, long and hard.  “In my professional opinion, you need to drop your cover and figure out what _you’re_ thinking, first.”

And with that, the orchestra begins to tune, dragging their bows against all the wrong notes, horns blowing hot air through their instruments.  It’s a twinkling sound of excitement for all the things yet to come, and as the lights dim down on the house, Penelope watches the stage and reminds herself that she is no longer a ballerina who falls.


	5. Clean Break

It’s the day after that Dom Perignon, and Penelope has been cleaning.  She’s cleaned up November, found it at the bottom of all those empty brown bottles and in the strands of crimson string that link her picture to a wall of others.  She’s cleaned up December, thrown away that ratty old punching bag and packed up all the tapes and bandages she no longer needs.  January had been hidden under piles of undone laundry, unwashed sheets, comforters smelling of long, lazy Sundays and soaking wet nightmares.  February had been the uneaten chocolates, the uneaten dinners, the uneaten _everything,_ spoiled food on every last shelf of the refrigerator, and now: March.  

It’s a very happy birthday for the youngest—no longer the smallest—brother of five. These days Alan is the sort of uncomfortably lean boy that John had been before he’d fully grown into himself.  Everything about him is too long, too thin, and it’s all happening so fast that he seems to have lost track of his own limbs.  He’s taller than she is, although that has been true for a while, but the full inch of height over Virgil is a bit of a new development.

This is among the things that go unmentioned over dinner.

And in fact, there are a number of things that go unmentioned over dinner, not the least of which being that this is Penelope’s first time hosting dinner in a very long time.  There are a lot of compliments on her roast, plenty of politesse regarding her outfit, her hair, how the cinnamon scent of apple pie is the best thing they’ve smelled all week, but no one mentions how ridged she is.  No one mentions how clean everything feels  It’s possible that they just don’t notice, but that seems unlikely.  This particular group of people tend to notice far more than they are given credit for.

“Okay, well, to be fair, it was a huge goose,” says Gordon.  “Those things are terrifying, man.  Have you seen how many teeth they have?”

“Are you saying you couldn’t take on a goose if the situation called for it?” says John, long arms reaching across Penelope as if she hosts a boarding house exclusively for Tracy brothers and if he doesn’t grab a dinner roll right this second, he never will.

Gordon’s reply is accompanied with a point of his fork. “I’m saying that no one can take on a goose, because they’re brutal, and they’re mean, and their greatest evolutionary trait is that they’re angry at the whole world.”

“Well by that definition, you can’t take on a badger either,” says Virgil.

“Or fire ants,” says Scott.

“Pass the potatoes,” says Gordon.

“Or Barracudas.”

“Ooh, barracuda.  Good one.”

“The _potatoes_.”

Scott, always with the manners, “Say please, you heathen.”

Gordon stuffs his cheek full of roasted carrot.  “Pass the potatoes, or you can kiss your slice of apple pie goodbye.”

Scott passes the potatoes.

Gordon scoops a couple of mounds onto the corner of his plate, licking his hand clean before he passes the dish off to the next in line.  Alan’s already had about four servings of potato and he shows no sign of yielding.  She swears these boys would starve without her dinners.  How did they make it through the last four months?  How did they survive those eleven days?  How long has it been, since they were last at this table together?

“I hope that’s okay, Alan,” she says instead.  “Pie instead of cake.  I really should have asked first.”

Alan, who has already shoved the entirety of his potato volcano into his mouth, waves her off and shakes his head.  John translates.  “Honestly, Penelope.  It’s fine.  Alan would eat goose feathers if they were served a la mode.”

Gordon’s fork clatters against the rim of his plate.  “I’m never living the goose thing down, am I?”

He’s met with a chorus of various _no_ s before Scott attempts to further translate Alan’s puffed cheeks.  “Really, Lady P.  He’s thankful for whatever you’ve got.  We all are.  Dinner is great, dessert smells delicious.  Everything’s just great.  Don’t worry too much on our account.”

“We’re just glad everyone’s home,” says Virgil.

She wonders how much money she could accumulate if she collected a dollar every time one of them said those exact words.  Would it be closer to double her current fortune, or triple?  “Mmm.  Yes.  Well.”  She stands.  “If anyone needs me, I’ll just be cutting the pie.  Won’t be a moment.”

And it’s true that sometimes—sometimes she just needs to step away.  To catch her breath.  Sometimes they suffocate her and she just needs to come up for air.  She hates this.  She hates that she gets so angry with them—hates that she’s angry with the entire world, all of the time.

One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand, four.  Five one thousand, six one thousand—

“Uhh.  Um, hey.”  Her breathing stops.  She has to check her hands, make sure they’re no longer stained by twists of red and purple.  “Hey, uh, Lady P—Penelope?  Penny?  Aww jeez, I never know what to call you anymore.  Do you want help with that pie?”

She’s got a knife in her hand, and it’s maybe a little bit concerning that she can’t actually remember grabbing it.  “Hmm?” she says.  “Sorry, what was that?  Help?  Help with what.”

Alan creeps his way through the kitchen’s arch, sending a shrug through his shoulders.  “I dunno,” he says.  “Thought maybe you could use some help cutting it or something.”

“I know how to use a knife.”

“Sure.  Maybe I could scoop some ice cream, though?”

“Alan—”

“It’s just that I’m pretty sure I know what you’re thinking, is all,” he says, and any debate she had lined up is suddenly stuck on her tongue.  “I mean, tell me if I’m wrong.  I don’t wanna make assumptions, but they do kinda drown people in affection sometimes—oh shit.  Sorry.  Not my best choice of words.”

“It’s fine.”  It’s not, but she’s been cleaning up the past four months from top to bottom, so it’s not as bad as it used to be.  She’s mostly focused on what he means, more so than what he’s actually said.  “Sorry.  Who?”

“The brothers,” says Alan, pulling fresh vanilla bean ice cream out of the freezer.  “Sometimes they’re a lot to handle, but they mean well.  You know that.”

She does, in fact, know that.  It’s the thing that makes her skin curl.  Their good intentions are only ever met with ugly, irrational rage.  “Yes,” she says.  “You’ve all been very patient with me, and I really do appreciate it.”

“Oh come _on_ ,” he whines.  “Sorry, Lady P, but they’re killing you with kindness and we both know it.  I’ve spent the majority of my life as a member of a private rescue squad led by my older brothers, facing fatality every other Tuesday.  I know _fed up with Scott_  when I see it, except you’re fed up with all of us—”

“It’s really—”

“—and that’s totally fine.”

And it’s a beat.  A pause.  A static charge in the air as she waits for him to finish what he has to say, because as far as she can tell, Alan Tracy is a liar.  “Come again?”

“It’s real nice to have family around,” he says, rummaging through the drawers, searching for the scoop.  “But sometimes it’s not.  And that’s okay.  It’s okay to want to punch Scott in the face sometimes.  It’s okay to want to kick Gordon right in the shins.  I’m no expert in post trauma or anything, but I have picked up a thing or two, and I know that you’re supposed to be mad.”

“It’s not post trauma.”

“It is though, but that’s totally not my point.”  He’s finally found the scoop, just in time to start loading the warm apple pie up with cream.  “I know you didn’t ask for my advice, but can I just say that it doesn’t matter?  Not for this, anyways.  Take it from me, Lady P.  They were gonna baby you either way.  They did it to me, they did it to Kayo, they did it to Gordon, and they’ll do it to you.”

“I do hope you get to the point before all of this ice cream melts.”

He shrugs once more.  “They’re not babying you because you’re a trauma victim.  They’re babying you because you’re family, and that’s just what happens. Sometimes you might like it.  Sometimes you might not.  Either way, you’re stuck with us—name change or not, you’re a Tracy, and believe me when I say it comes with Terms and Conditions.”  He smiles at her, gentle.  Wide.  That much hasn’t changed with age.  “We love you, Penelope.  And in this family, love generally means dealing with everyone’s traumas.  Together.  I’m not saying it’s ideal, or whatever.  It’s definitely not _normal_ , but that’s just… what it means for us.  Always has.” 

It’s hard to imagine—the concept of shared trauma.  She doesn’t share missions, doesn’t share mistakes, so it seems like the aftermath should be just as isolated.  Just as confined.  But then, of course, it’s easier to clean when the duties are split. It’s easier to serve pie when there’s another pair of hands scooping the ice cream.  They lighten the load, these Tracy boys, these brothers, and she starts to feel the weight of an ocean draining at her feet.  “I’ll keep that in mind,” she says, looking up at the boy, no longer a teenager.  “Thank you, Alan.”

He takes a few plates, grabs a handful of forks.  “No problem, Lady P,” he says.  “I’ll save this big piece for you—and, uh, well.  I really am glad you’re home.”

Penelope smiles.  “Me too.”


End file.
